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68
THE JAMES STREET AREA.
The improvement of the James-street area, which, it was hoped, would have been completed
long ago, under the private Act obtained by the promoters, still hangs fire. The time allowed for
Compulsory purchase of properties required for the improvement expired in August, 1899, and the
time allowed for the completion of the scheme will expire in August, 1901. James-street is in a
woe-begone condition: many of the houses have been pulled down, and few of the old inhabitants
remain. The need for a street improvement in the locality, to establish easy communication
between South Kensington and Kensington High-street, west of the church, has long been felt, and
happily this part of the scheme will ere long be carried into effect.
UNDERGROUND ROOMS ILLEGALLY OCCUPIED.
In a number of instances rooms" underground" were found to be illegally occupied—in
Sirdar-road, in the special area, and in other parts of the borough. The illegal occupation was
in each case discontinued on the service of a written intimation or a statutory notice.
OVERCROWDING AND PAUPERISM.
Statements having been made that the action of the sanitary authority for the abatement
of overcrowding, and other nuisances, frequently became the means of driving people into the
workhouse, and so conduced to pauperism, the matter was investigated, so far as practicable having
regard to the generality of the statements and the want of information as to specific cases. In one
case only, were necessary details furnished so as to enable a decisive opinion to be formed on the
subject. It was the case of a family alleged to have been driven into the workhouse owing to the
action of the sanitary committee, through which the home had been broken up and lost, notice to
carry out certain works of cleansing at the (registered) house having been served on the landlord.
The name of the head of the family (which comprised a wife and eight children) and his late address,
having been obtained, the case was investigated by the clerk to the guardians, who informed me
that the man, who bore a very bad character, had been ejected from his lodging by the police for
rent due to his landlord, amounting to about £6. The case illustrates the unreliability of statements
made by able-bodied persons when questioned as to the cause for their entering the workhouse.
Overcrowding is, occasionally, brought about by the action of railway companies, who are
not required to provide for the rehousing of persons displaced by the pulling down of their houses,
provided that fewer than twenty are compulsorily acquired at any one time. This subject was
brought to the attention of the sanitary authorities in February, by the late Vestry of St. Georgethe-Martyr,
Southwark, the suggestion being made that the School Board should be compelled to
provide housing accommodation for persons displaced by their action: the Vestry, moreover,
advocated an amendment of the Standing Order of the House of Commons, so that all classes of
" Promoters" should be required to make provision for rehousing, even where a smaller number
than twenty houses are taken. The said Vestry, however, had overlooked the fact that Parliament
had dealt with the subject, in the Session of 1899, by bringing the School Board for London under
the Standing Order, as regards liability for rehousing persons displaced, a clause with this object
having been inserted in their Provisional Order Confirmation (London) Act, 1899; the clause,
moreover, being made retrospective in its operation : it being provided therein that all houses or
lands occupied by persons of the labouring class taken by the Board in the previous five years,
should be regarded as acquired under that Act. No houses have been so acquired in the borough
within that period, but the subject is of interest to the Borough Council in view of demolitions
shortly expected—at Southam-street and Wornington-road more particularly—in connection with
the proposed widening of the Great Western Railway in that locality.
HYGIENIC STREET PAVING.
During the year some progress was made in the paving with asphalte of streets in poor
localities, where traffic is small; such streets, moreover, being largely used by children as playgrounds.
This practice, commenced in the Potteries district, and carried out completely in the
" Notting-dale " special area, with great and manifest advantage in every respect, will, I hope, be
largely extended. In December, 1899, upon the report of the sanitary committee that " it was
desirable on sanitary and economical grounds," the late Vestry resolved to asphalte-pave five additional
streets, viz., Mary-place, Lockton-street, Hesketh-place, Testerton-street, and Mersey-street, all in
North Kensington. These streets were paved in 1900, and, in addition, Aldermaston-street, Bramleystreet
and St. George's-road, in North Kensington; Child-street, and the passage at the rear of
Rich-terrace, in South Kensington.